In the prior art a number of different carton arrangements are commonly used for protecting containers having a high finish. One common arrangement involves the use of corrugated paperboard dividers interlocked to form individual pockets in the carton for each container. Such arrangements while adequately cushioning and protecting individual containers in a shipping carton, do not permit groups of the containers to be removed from the shipping carton as a unit where, for example, a distributor or shipping clerk must handle or distribute containers of the carton in less than a full case lot before final placement on a store shelf. Where such further distribution in less than case lots is necessary prior known arrangements generally involve a cardboard sleeve for packaging a subgroup of the total number of containers in the carton, with a number of such subgroups making up a full case lot or shipping carton. Such sleeves adequately cushion individual containers in the case or carton and further allow a shipping clerk to remove and further handle groups of the containers as a unit prior to final placement of individual containers on a store shelf. The major disadvantage of paperboard or cardboard dividers or sleeves in shipping cartons is the expense of such arrangements because of the relatively large amount of paperboard material involved in such constructions.
Packaging of a plurality of containers into groups to form a retail multipackage for use by a retail customer in purchasing a group of multipackaging containers is well-known in the form of a plurality of integrally interconnected plastic bands or rings such as shown, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 2,874,835. While such carriers or multipackaging devices have had various forms of tabs for preventing chime override in the shipment of such multipackages and while such multipackaging devices or carriers have also included various arrangements for fracturing the plastic bands to remove individual containers, none of the prior known devices are adequate for a case or shipping carton arrangement where the containers must be adequately separated and cushioned from each other, where means must be provided to prevent chime override, where subgrouping of the containers in a shipping carton is required, and where the individual containers must be quickly and easily separated from the encircling bands to permit rapid break down of a carton and subgroups in distribution and store shelf stocking procedures.